Even after Bryce’s warning, Dave still refused to step away.
"Since you’ve been cheating on me too, what right do you have to be angry at me?" Dave questioned, his voice filled with frustration. "And what reason did you even have to do it if the person you were with is still a man, just like me? The only reason I ended up with Kara is because I’m bisexual. Sometimes I have desires for things that are different from what we have, but what reason did you have?"
Bryce stared at him in disbelief.
"You know, for a moment, I thought you would actually admit that you were wrong," Bryce said quietly, his voice carrying more disappointment than anger. "I thought you would understand that you hurt me, and maybe admit that even if hurting me wasn’t your intention, your actions still caused damage."
His expression hardened.
"But if all you’re going to do is stand there and keep finding reasons to excuse what you did, then I don’t think this relationship deserves another chance."
This time, Bryce forced Dave’s hand away from him.
The strange strength that had appeared earlier still flowed through his body, making the movement far easier than it should have been. Before Dave could react, he turned toward the exit.
The apartment suddenly felt unbearable. The pain he had thought he had escaped returned all at once, sharper than before.
The realization that he had never been enough. Bryce couldn’t stay there another second.
He didn’t want to hear another explanation. He didn’t want to argue anymore. He knew the conversation would never end if he remained inside that apartment.
"Why are you acting like I’m the only one who did something wrong when you have clearly been with someone else too, and not just once?" Dave’s voice followed him.
Bryce tried to ignore it.
He really did.
But his feet stopped before he reached the door, and after a moment, he turned around.
"Because I never cheated on you," he said, his voice low but firm. "Not once."
His chest tightened as he forced himself to continue.
"Even tonight, I never planned to betray you. But what did you do?"
The vulnerability threatening to break through terrified him. He didn’t want Dave to see how much he was hurting. He didn’t want him to realize that despite everything, there was still a part of him that was mourning the person he thought Dave was.
So he buried it beneath finality.
"I’m only going to say this once."
His gaze remained fixed on Dave.
"I’ll never see you the same way again, no matter how hard I try. I won’t be able to look at you and feel what I felt before. So we’re done."
His voice became quieter.
"And I don’t want to talk about this anymore."
With that, he turned away and continued toward the door, but Dave reached for him again.
"I’m sorry, but this isn’t a decision only you can make," he said. "I invested years of my life into this too. I invested my emotions, my time, everything. I love you, and I made a mistake, and just because..."
Dave didn’t get the chance to finish. The moment he reached out to stop Bryce, Bryce instinctively shoved him away again.
Without giving him another opportunity to grab him again, he turned, stepped out of the apartment, and pulled the door shut behind him.
He walked down the stairs with a heavy weight pressing against his chest, thousands of emotions crashing into one another inside him until they became impossible to separate.
The only thing he could think of that might quiet the turmoil was another run like the one he had taken barely an hour earlier.
The moment he stepped through the gate, he broke into a run, letting his legs carry him toward a nearby park.
Eventually, he reached G-Park.
The familiar sight of the empty pathways and silent trees greeted him as the first signs of dawn approached. He walked toward one of the benches and lowered himself onto it, allowing the cold morning air to surround him.
He hoped the chill would numb everything. But even as the cold seeped through him, he couldn’t escape any of it.
The ache remained.
Even so, the encounter he had just had with Dave and the fresh wounds it had reopened couldn’t keep his thoughts from wandering elsewhere.
Vincent.
He had just walked away from a six year relationship that had fallen apart, yet somehow, his thoughts kept circling back to a man he had met only hours ago.
As morning light slowly spread across the sky, Bryce knew he couldn’t remain sitting there forever. The park that had offered him temporary peace would not solve the problems waiting for him.
He still needed a job.
He had uploaded his details to several online job platforms, hoping that somehow a company would notice his qualifications and reach out to him, but opportunities like that didn’t simply appear because someone wished for them.
He needed to be realistic.
Right now, he needed income more than he needed a dream.
Any job would be enough.
Even if it had nothing to do with what he had studied, as long as it provided enough money for him to survive and find another place to live.
Remaining in the apartment with Dave was no longer an option.
With a tired sigh, he stood and left the park, making his way back toward the apartment building. He needed a shower and his documents.
However, the moment he reached the door, he noticed it wasn’t completely closed.
He froze as the sight of the open door brought him to an abrupt halt. It was never left open, not even when they were inside.
What if he had hurt Dave when he pushed him earlier and someone had entered the apartment because of it?
His heart began pounding violently as he stepped inside, but his fear slowly shifted into confusion as he looked around.
The place was empty.
Not just empty of people.
Everything was gone. The furniture, the decorations, the countless little things that had made the apartment feel like their home, even the bag containing his important documents and every piece of clothing he owned had disappeared.
For several seconds, Bryce simply stood there, unable to process what he was seeing.
"You’ve got to be kidding me..." Bryce muttered in disbelief, his fists slowly clenching at his sides again. "I never knew you were this much of a psycho," he continued, "Where the hell was this side of you hiding all this time?"
Before he could think of what to do next, his phone suddenly vibrated. The message notification came from Dave’s number.
Bryce opened it immediately.
"Only after you stop this madness of wanting to end our long-term relationship and break both our hearts as if everything we’ve shared never mattered will I come for you. Then we can move into our new place. I already bought it for us.
The faster you come back to your senses, the faster you’ll get your belongings back and have somewhere to live, because I’ve already sold the apartment to someone else."
Bryce stared at the message, unable to believe what he was reading. And before he could recover from the shock, another notification appeared.
This time, it was an email from LuminousLoom Company.
His eyes widened.
For a moment, he wondered if he was seeing incorrectly.
Because the company that had just contacted him...
Was Vincent’s company.